A Weighted Lesson
by A Damsel In Distress
Summary: "I lift that much so I can pick my brothers up when they fall, lil' brother." Mikey decides to have a go at his brother's barbell machine and not only breaks it but injures himself in the process. Raphael is furious but not for the reason the youngest turtle thought. OneShot. Raph and Mikey brother fluff. Rated T for very minimal swearing.


**Disclaimer: I DO NOT OWN ANY SHAPE, WAY, OR FORM, OF THE TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES.**

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Michelangelo always wondered why his hot headed brother bench pressed around 2000 pounds. He noticed that Raphael always bench pressed no less than 1000 and no more than 2600. Leo occasionally bench pressed but not nearly as much, in weight or as many times, as the second eldest did. Mikey was sure Donnie tried once or twice when he first made the machine to fit to their needs, seeing as they were three or four times heavier than the average human. The Bo wielding turtle gave up quickly, realizing he was better off sticking to the basic workouts and his books or inventions or research or coffee, or other Donnie things.

Mikey himself didn't even bother trying. What with all the new comics books, cartoon shows, and skateboarding that had to be read, watched, and ridden, he had no time for a machine he would get bored with in a mere minute.

Honestly, the youngest turtle didn't even really know how he did gain muscle in the first place. He only stuck to skateboarding and the basic workout Splinter provided every morning and that really was it. The only lifting he did was the couch. Leo claimed he had OCD about the underneath of it being completely cleaned and blamed in on Mikey for letting all his chips fall under. Therefore, the smaller turtle was chosen to lift up the couch twelve times in a row, three times a day. He thought Leo was just being perfect little leader Leo but now that he thought about it...

Raph and Leo lifted twelve reps for three times in their bench pressing workouts.

_That guy!_ Mikey thought disbelievingly. All this time he believed Leo actually had OCD about vacuuming under the couch but that traitor was doing it on purpose!

"Good one bro, next time you pull out a vacuum just try and find me," Mikey grumbled out loud to himself.

Where were his oh so lovely, but sometimes deceiving brothers anyway?

Mikey got off the couch that he promised he'd never lift again and started walking towards Donnie's lab. He could hear his brother typing ferociously on the keyboard through the closed door. He put on hand on the door to let himself until the two hour ago flashback popped up into his head.

"…_so please, please, please, don't bother me until dinner." Don said as he grimly stared at his younger brother. _

"_Why are you looking at me bro?!" Mikey asked with fake hurt. _

"_You know why. I mean it Mikey this is really important to me."_

"_Okay, okay Donnie I promise." Mikey rolled his eyes. Every project is important to Don why is this any different?_

_Leo had the turtle balls to ask. _

"_What's this project of yours about anyways?"_

"_Well it's about molecular…" Blah blah blah blah blah._

The orange banded turtle took his hand back off the door and let Donnie have his peace and quiet. He did promise after all and he never broke a promise no matter how small or large they were. Mikey never did get what his brother was working on in there. Once he heard the word _molecular_ he ran off to find the closest sewer entrance. No point in sticking around if he already knew he wouldn't understand Donnie's geek talk.

Well now Mikey had two other brothers to find and possibly annoy. Especially Leo for the stunt he's been pulling for three years now.

"LEEEEE~OOOO!" The young turtle called out in a sing-song manner.

There was no response.

"LEO BRO! Where are-"

"He went out running Mikey! Won't be back for another half hour!" Donnie called back to shut his brother up.

_Well then, two down one to go._

"RAP-"

"Out with Casey! I think there's a new episode of that favorite cartoon you like so much on right now! Why don't you go watch it?" Donnie asked through his still closed lab door.

_What a rudely polite way to say "Shut the shell up and leave me the shell alone." _Mikey thought.

"Thanks Donnie-Boy, I think I will!" He called back to assure his brother he wouldn't be of bother anymore.

Knowing his purple masked brother made that whole cartoon thing up, Michelangelo headed to the dojo. Maybe he'd find something interesting to do in there. Besides katas. And weapons training. And any form, shape, or way of exercise.

"Maybe I'll start drawing again," he spoke out loud to himself, putting a green finger to his chin, deep in thought about what he should do with his leisure time.

If its one thing Mikey hated the most it was being bored. He already played video games and read the new comic he bought last night after patrol.

_What to do, oh what to do?_

The nun-chuck wielder looked around the dojo for ideas and almost turned to leave until he spotted the bench press machine over in the corner.

Yeah, it was definitely a fun shiny piece of equipment for the carefree turtle to mess with. He vaguely remembered Raph saying something about if he ever wanted to use it make sure to go grab a "spotter," whatever that meant.

The more he looked at the machine, the more curious he was to try it out.

_Raph uses it like ALL the time. How hard could it be? _ Besides, he lifted couches apparently for a living now so Mikey was sure he had the muscle his brother did.

_Even if doesn't show as much…_

"Hmmm…" Mikey thought. _Now how does this work again?_

Mikey spotted the different sizes of weights to the right. If he could remember correctly, he saw Raph grab a few of them and put it on the metal bar thing that hung above the laying down thing.

_What did Raph call it again? _Mikey thought to himself, trying to remember what Raph's terms were for the machine. _Whatever, not important. _

"Wellllllll," the turtle drawled out looking at the weights still. "The couch is like 500 pounds give or take…" the orange masked turtle exaggerated. What did he know about the weights of couches? He never thought to throw one on a Donnie invented scale until now.

"I think Raphie first puts on two 500 pound weights to start with," Michelangelo said, picking up the weights one by one to put on the bar. They were each labeled "500 lbs" in a faded white stenciled on paint.

Mikey took a step back to make sure it looked right. He tilted his head in thought. He was missing something. _What else did he use?_

The turtle shrugged his shoulders, it looked good to him. Mikey took his spot under the bar and laid down. All he had to do now was take the bar off the rack it was set on and push it up and down twelve times. How hard could that really be? There was technically only one weight on each side.

He knew he was probably being a little over confident but that was just Mikey's style. The youngest turtle took the bar off the rack with a grunt and quickly pushed it up toward the ceiling. He held it there for a second, testing the barbell out.

_This isn't too bad, _he thought as he bent his elbows towards his chest to lower the bar. He pushed it back up with ease and did a few more.

_This is weak sauce; I'll try Raph's max. Now that seems like a fun challe- Uh! What the shell?!_

As Mikey pushed the bar back towards the rack, he started to lose his grip on the right side. The whole bar started leaning that way as he lost his balance half way off the seat. His left arm collapsed under the weight still piled on the left side of the bar as the weight on the right side slipped off and hit the ground with a big thump. At this point he dropped the bar so that half of it hit the floor and the other half rested against his shoulder as he was now trying to gain his balance back by putting two hands on the ground.

"That's what I was missing!" Mikey shouted to the empty dojo. The said turtle pushed himself off the ground and onto the bar. He then pushed the bar so it was leveled vertically on the ground and pushed himself the rest of the way up.

_Those clampy things! They hold the weights in place, no wonder. _Mikey mentally slapped himself upside his own head for the mistake. _I knew I was missing something!_

The orange masked turtle waited a minute or two to see if Don had heard the ruckus but he figured not, especially if his brother really was putting all his focus into his project. Now that the turtle knew what he was missing, he took off all weights to set the bar back on the rack again. No damage was done to his bodacious body so he decided to continue with his plan to out lift Raph.

_I think he put on two 500's, and one 300 on each side for his max. _

The daring Michelangelo just did as that. He grabbed the weight holders and clamped down on them to slide it onto the bar and released his hold. For a safety measure he tried tugging the weights towards it to make sure they would stay in place this time and they did.

"There we go!" He smiled excitedly to himself. If he can lift in a day, what Raph lifts 365 days of the year, he'd get endless joke and making fun points. And Mikey REALLY wanted those points.

The turtle eagerly spit on his hands and rubbed them together as if he was trying to start a fire, smiling devilishly.

_Raph is sooooo gonna get it. _

Laying down again Mikey put his hands to the bar once more not knowing that his oldest brothers had both come back from being topside. He thought he heard some kind of faint banter in the living room as sounds of music stated to blare across the lair but he chose to ignore it.

"Alright Mikester, you're the Battle Nexus Champion! You can do this! On the count of three…" Mikey prepped talked himself so he wouldn't chicken out of it. He was never one to back down from a challenge and definitely not his own.

"One…" The nun-chuck wielder gripped the bar tightly.

"Two…" He started to push.

"THRE-**ARRRGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!**"

The second Michelangelo lifted the bar completely off the rack, his wrists collapsed from the ridiculously heavy barbell. His left wrist seemed to have buckled first and so the barbell titled that way and fell on top of the shocked turtle. There was a sickening _crack_ that he felt and heard as well as _pop. _The barbell had managed to push the turtles left arm at a weird angle up over his head as his shoulder turned right and the rest of his arm turned left. All he could feel was pain.

Breathing heavily, and looking to the door of the dojo for help he found no one to his rescue.

"D-D…UGHHH!" The now injured turtle yelled in frustration. The pain kept him from thinking, from speaking, and very close to not breathing.

Mikey confirmed to himself that his right arm turned out to be okay and tried to push the rest of the bar off him but to no avail. It was just too heavy. How did Raph lift so much?

Since the barbell had stabilized itself leaning diagonally across Michelangelo, the said turtle decided to take a deep painful breath and slide to the right of the bar where there was more open space. He push the left side up a bit with his injured arm as he grunted out in pain to make some room for him to slide.

He quickly bent his legs and back into a bridge style to slide himself forward on the seat and completely out of the way of the "almost killed him bar." Before hitting his back to the ground, he put one leg over the other to gain his balance and flipped over so that he was standing right side up again.

Angry and pain filled tears started their way down his cheeks.

_So stupid!_ He thought to himself as he clenched his eyes shut, bending over to hold onto the bench with his good arm. He was getting paler by the second, coming close to gagging.

He needed to gain his composure a bit before taking a trip to the family doctor.

As some of the pain subsided and he gained some oxygen back he dared to open his eyes. The room spun for a second before his eyes focused on the bench in front of him that he laid on moments ago.

It had broken.

Forget about the pain, Raph was going to straight up _kill_ him. How was he going to explain this? What was he going to do? Where was he going to get another bench without Raph noticing?

_He's going to shred my shell! I'm so screwed! _

Raph used this machine more than his beloved punching bag these days. In fact the hotheaded turtle hung out with the bench press more than Mikey sometimes. This would be like Raph slicing up his youngest brother's nun-chucks. It was the only thing Mikey loved more than his family and his cat. But Raph didn't do that! Mikey was the one who broke his brother's only workout machine.

_And Donnie! He's gonna be so pissed that I broke one of his more expensive inventions!_ _Shellllll!_

Mikey still stood there in silence, mouth hanging open still in shock. He couldn't feel pain at all anymore. Too many questions, too much guilt, too much dread, just too much going through his mind right now.

The top part of the bench had broken backward. With the weight of the barbell on top of Mikey's weight crushing down toward the Earth, no wonder it broke.

Mikey almost felt like crying just from pure guilt alone. He was actually trying to work out for once! Maybe not the right way but it was still working out! He wasn't even trying to pull a prank this time.

_Maybe I could call April….or maybe Casey will help_, Mikey sullenly thought. He just had to fix this-

"_**WHAT THE SHELL HAPPENED HERE?!" **_

There was only one turtle that the deep growling voice filled with layers upon layers of dangerous anger belonged to.

Mikey slowly turned his head to the side to meet his older brother's furious glare. If looks could kill, he probably would have died five times right then. Or a hundred and five.

Mikey's never seen this look from his older brother before. Not when fighting Shredder, the foot ninja, just never. He didn't know his brother loved his machine _that _much. With blue eyes still glued wide open and lips starting to tremble a bit from fear the younger turtle started to try and explain himself.

"R-Raph…" The orange masked turtle managed to get out as he watched the nostrils of his older brother flare from heavy rugged breathing. Raph was like a wild bull let out from gates that held him in an enclosed space for too long. His mask certainly was the right color for it.

Pushing himself off the bench Mikey held his good arm up as if surrendering to the cops and tried to do so with the left arm but that went a bit more poorly. He took a tentative step forward.

"Raph I swear bro, I didn't meant it! I-I was just trying it out! I wouldn't damage it on purpose I swear! I-I'm SO SO SO sorry! I'll fix it! I'll get you a new one! A better one! I promise Raph," Michelangelo rambled on. He was looking back and forth from the machine to Raph in his rant hoping to calm his brother down. The orange masked turtle was begging for his brother's forgiveness at this point.

"Raph? I'm really sorry. I swear I'll make it up to you!" Mikey tried again, tears threatening to spill down his pale green cheeks. Raphael was turning darker shades of green by the second. Mikey couldn't believe Raph had any more levels of anger but boy was he proved wrong.

The older turtle looked at the younger with his teeth bared, green eyes turned into slits with his fists clenched tightly to his sides.

"Raph! I said I was sorry! I didn't meant to! I was just trying it out! I didn't know it would break like that! I'll do whatever you want just please don't hurt me! Your machine did that for you!" Mikey pleaded taking another daring step forward. He was so sure his brother was going to take his already hurt shoulder and break it three ways into China.

"_**I KNOW."**_

Mikey paused in his guilty speech. He didn't know what else to do or say.

Raph took this moment and started in at him.

The nun-chuck wielder finally let his tears fall. He screwed up so big this time and he knew it. He knew he deserved whatever Raph was ready to throw at him.

The red masked turtle took a couple of large strides to reach his brother. By this time, Mikey had his eyes shut tightly, tensing in anticipation of what his brother was about to do.

"I-I'm s-sorry, I'm s-s-so s-sorry…" He tried for the last time, hiccuping in the process.

Once Raphael was towering his younger brother he tried to get his attention.

"_**Mikey." **_

The said turtle gasped at his name, terrified, and sniffed the snot back into his nose. He flinched when a gentle hand cupped his chin.

"_**Mikey."**_ Raph tried again looking down at the sobbing turtle, forcing his brother's head upward but still in the gentle manner.

Mikey finally opened his eyes to see most of the anger gone from Raphael and instead saw concern. Raph looked almost confused as to why his brother was sobbing his little heart out of that stupid machine.

"What happened to _you?" _Raph asked almost whisper like.

The younger turtle, head still stuck in place from his brother holding it, tried to move back and looked over at the machine again.

Raph let go.

"I-I broke your machine-I was trying to use it-it was just too heavy," Mikey looked back at Raph, "I'm _really _sorry…I'll do-"

The nun-chuck wielder stopped talking as his hotheaded brother's anger came back.

Raph was gentle but firm in his words as he said, "No Mikey. What happened to _you?_ What happened to your arm? What happened to your collarbone there?" Raph asked, looking his brother up and down for any other injuries he could find. "What happened to _you?" _

Mikey took a second to look at his older brother. Why did Raph want to know what happened to him? It was his own fault that he ended up with his injuries.

"But Raph-I broke-"

"I DON'T CARE MIKEY! I don't care about that stupid machine! I don't care if it's broken, I don't care if you set it on fire and it melted to pieces! What the shell happened to you?! What else hurts huh?" His brother exploded. Even yelling though, Raph gently took Mikey's shoulder into his hand and leaned in closer to get a better look at it and his collar bone that was now turning into three shades of purple and blue.

"Geez Mikey! Look at you! Dislocated shoulda', cracked collarbone, you're paler than when ya' are sick!" Raph said, pressing on certain points of Mikey's arm and chest and stopping when his brother cringed in pain.

The sai wielder took a good long look into Mikey's baby blue eyes. It was like looking at an animal on the streets who so badly wanted to belong to a home.

"You need to see Don," was all the older turtle said before grabbing Mikey's non injured wrist and started for the dojo's exit.

The orange masked turtle was still so very confused with even more questions popping into his head. Why isn't Raph madder about the machine? Or maybe he just secretly was?

As they neared the exit Mikey tried one final attempt at apologizing.

"Raph…I really am sorry about-"

At this point, Raphael so was fed up with his younger brother's apologizes about the machine. With Mikey's good wrist still in his hand he pulled the turtle around into a 360 degree so that Mikey ended up in front of Raph, his back forced up against the wall next to the exit.

The sai wielder punched the wall above his cowering brother's head and glared down at him.

"I don't give a flying monkey's ass about that machine right now. You know what I thought when I walked in here?" Raph growled out leaning close to Mikey's shocked expression only staying about two inches away.

When the younger turtle didn't answer, Raph continued.

"I thought, who tha' hell hurt my lil' brotha'. I thought I had to go back topside and kill someone tonight Mikey. I didn't even see that the bench was broken till' you kept rambling on bout' it. When I finally put the pieces together of what happened, I couldn't believe that the whole left side of your body would be so messed up from it. I can't kill a machine that's not alive for hurtin' ya' but I don't blame ya' fer' anythin' either. Understood?" Raph finished, almost breathing down Mikey's throat.

The said turtle still was frozen in place as he let the words of his brother repeat through his head. He did understand now.

He _scared_ the crap out of Raph. And that was Raph's way of telling him. Mikey finally felt relieved that his brother wouldn't be torturing him for breaking his toy.

"I didn't mean for this to happen…" the orange banded turtle mumbled out, closing his eyes.

"I know Mikey. Now c'mon, let's go see Don."

Raph retracted his punch to the wall as he stared down fondly at his youngest brother. He knew this was all some kind of accident even if Mikey was messing around with his weights. He only cared for the safety of his brother right now. Nothing else mattered than getting Mikey patched up and pain free.

Michelangelo, now feeling a little less guilty, had started feeling too faint and exhausted from the whole incident. He could suddenly feel the sharp and throbbing pains shooting down his arm as well as in his chest. He felt like he was going to throw up again.

Raph noticed this and took a step forward to his struggling brother. He was met with Mikey's head falling against his plastron, knees buckling.

The sai wielder picked up his youngest brother bridal style, as gently as he could without touching his injured arm. He took a minute to look down at Mikey, noticing the struggle he was going through. His heart clenched inside for his brother. There was nothing he could do but get him to Don as soon as possible.

"Let's get you fixed up," Raph said as he started walking out of the dojo.

Michelangelo was still at least somewhat conscious and was still curious to why his brother lifted so much. It just seemed unnecessary.

"Raph?" he asked, in a croaked voice.

His brother didn't stop walking but looked down and replied, "Yeah, Mikey?"

"Why do you lift so much?"

Raph chuckled a bit before responding, looking down into Mikey's somewhat opened eyes.

"You weigh bout'1100 pounds. Yer' the lightest of us all. Leo's the heaviest afta' me, weighing around 2000. Donnie is somewhere in the middle right?"

"Yeah, I guess?" Mikey question, still confused to what his brother was getting at.

"I lift that much so I can pick mah' brothers up when they fall, lil' brother."

And with that Mikey smiled to himself, the answer was just so simple and Raph-like. He then let the darkness consume him as he escaped from the pain. He would be alright. Especially with Raph always by his side.

**End.**

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This story came to me because every time I go to the gym, downstairs is unintentionally dedicated to all the guys and most of it is just lifting weights. They're all like trying to prove their masculinity to one another I think it's just kind of funny. But still, go them! Also I really don't know the weight of a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle haha. I looked up the world record for lifting weights on the barbell and added like another 1000 to it due to the fact that the turtles probably would weigh more and have more strength than humans do. Also do NOT try lifting by yourself at home unless you are experienced or a professional. Anyways I hope you all enjoyed the fun little story while I get my other one ready for its next chapter! Please review and tell me what you thought! Thank you!


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